Reviews
Jo Harrop Album: Love Now Pay Later
Label: Lateralize
Tracks: 12
Website: https://www.joharrop.com
I'd lay a crisp tenner bet that Jo Harrop is pretty bored of having her voice described as "smoky" but to be honest she ain't helping much. Not only does this album include songs called 'Smoke In A Jar' and 'Smoke Joint' but almost the entirety of her new album suggests images of a worldly-wise singer meditatively hunched under the solitary spotlight of a New York jazz club shrouded in the kind of voluminous clouds of cigarette smoke which passed for normal back in the days when fags were described as medicinal.
Hailing from County Durham but now resident in London, Harrop's music is suggestive of a classic American canon, with well-crafted songs pitched somewhere between The Carpenters and Burt Bacharach, delivered with a rich voice one degree of longitude lower than Dusty Springfield.
As befits an album recorded in Sunset Studios in Hollywood, 'Love Now Pay Later' is well produced and very smooth but my favourite is track 8, a blues called 'Mr and Mrs Discreet' rendered that bit more sexy by its slightly unhinged guitar solo and extended coda. The album could easily have ended on this high point but instead moves on to what sounds to me like a thematically unnecessary addendum of polished Sade-era R&B and Motown balladeering.
Jo Harrop could easily make a tidy living headlining cabaret nights any night of the week, anywhere in the world. She'd fit the bill like a tailor-made velvet glove.
Jim Carey
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| Mark Mulholland, Joe Armstrong & Stephane Doucerain: Down Silver Streets | Driving Mrs Satan: Late Ever After |
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Love Now Pay Later (Sample)
Fatea Showcase Sessions
The Fatea Showcase Sessions are a series of downloads featuring acts that we've really enjoyed and think that more people should get the chance to hear.
Pirate is the current session and features 16 fantastic artists check out the website to find out more about them and download your copy
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